


Karats for Everyone to See

by memeicorn



Category: Youtubers, markiplier - Fandom
Genre: ????????????, Angst, Flash Fiction, Jealousy, M/M, One-Sided Attraction, Pining, Yikes, ventfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-08
Updated: 2017-07-08
Packaged: 2018-11-29 05:47:12
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 443
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11434425
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/memeicorn/pseuds/memeicorn
Summary: He only has himself to blame.





	Karats for Everyone to See

**Author's Note:**

> who knows
> 
> title is from the song "golden" by fall out boy

Ethan should have known so much better than this. 

All of his effort was for naught in the end. All the emails, texts, convention meetings... they didn't matter in the big picture, when he knew he could never be better than  _her_. 

The searing cold of envy bit him like mosquitoes in July. The rejection was never said, never acknowledged - just assumed. In spite of the silence, though, words from others screamed bloody murder in the back of Ethan's mind - "he'll never go for you", "you should stop trying", "you're wasting your time", "it's not going to work". He wishes so badly now that he'd heeded them, taken their word before it was too late. 

His feelings didn't make a difference now, not when Mark was seeing the world through coffee-coloured lenses. Ethan wonders if he's even noticed his sudden absences; they aren't always physical, but Ethan notes every moment he's checked out of his corporeal form in order to avoid feeling at all costs. That's how it is with him - he either feels too much or not at all. Ethan laughs bitterly when he thinks about it, like it's all a joke, because that's exactly what it seems to be. 

He only has himself to blame. 

He used to see Mark all swathed in white cloth, enshrouded head to toe, making a perfect, clean silhouette. The warm glow tempted Ethan beyond his every boundary. But he had never stopped to unveil Mark, never considered why his brain had seen so highly of someone he'd barely known. Running his fingers over the folds of the cloth only serves to remind him of the friction it creates, all honeycomb shapes dragging and scratching over one another.

Ethan knows he's been foolish. He now knows never to trust his mind. He wonders why anyone else bothered to trust it in the past either, after they'd all heard the sirens and seen the warning signs. He doesn't envy anyone who refused to obey them now. He knows he's exactly the kind of hazard they've all been warned about. 

Ethan watches himself rupture with dull, muted horror. He spills out onto hands and sheets, and he floods the pristine white cloth with ugly crimson splotches. Knowing they'll make for unsightly, indelible stains either way, he doesn't bother to run it under water. He leaves it as a spattered reminder of how his missteps have broken the sequence and ensured that he can never return to his blissful initial state.

It's no wonder to him anymore why Mark didn't look twice in his direction. Even if he could have had Mark, he knows he didn't really deserve him.

**Author's Note:**

> self-hatred is one hell of a drug, kids


End file.
